Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Selected Poems
NICOLAS BOILEAU
T F
B U RTON R A F F E L
J P
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability
of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity
of the Council on Library Resources.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To the memory of Alexander Pope, a very great English poet
whose praise led me to Boileau
Contents
There are many good reasons to read and enjoy Boileaus poetry. Let us begin
with three: first, his work offers an excellent means to understanding the precepts
of French Classicism, a movement of which he is often thought to be Frances
most important representative; second, his Art potique (the focus of the present
collection) is the most important example of literary theory from the golden age
of French literature; and third, his poetry is charming and accomplished in its
own right. Unfortunately, however, there are also reasons why Boileau does not
appeal immediately to modern audiences as much as his merit and interest would
warrant: he is a complex and subtle writer who demands that his reader should
work to understand his many nuances. This can be a particularly daunting
prospect for the modern reader of poetry who is not familiar with the climate of
late-seventeenth-century France. But those who take up this challenge are re-
warded with an appreciation of Boileaus delightful and intricate verse, the work
of one of the sharpest wits of his time. My purpose here is to guide the modern
reader toward an appreciation of Boileau on his own terms in order to judge him
by the standards of his day. In the course of this journey back to the reign of
Louis XIV, I hope that Boileaus relevance to the twenty-first century will be-
come apparent.
Since the Romantic era, we have come to expect poetry (of the nonex-
perimental variety at least) to be lyrical, confessional, and highly emotional. Sim-
ilarly, in our postmodern world, we distrust any form of dogmatism and our in-
stinct is to reject anything that smacks of universalism. Boileaus views on the
rights and wrongs of literary composition and his highly moralistic tone, then,
can seem distasteful to modern readers. But Boileau is very much a man of his
ix
time, and it is important to avoid anachronistic interpretations of his work and to
remember that his views were widely and sincerely held by some of the most im-
portant literary figures ever to have lived. Moreover, certain aspects of Boileaus
poetry (notably his emphasis on audience response) will emerge as being in strik-
ing agreement with current trends in literary criticism. In our consideration of
Boileau, we would do well to embrace the most important principle of his writ-
ing: the combination of pleasure and instruction. The content of Boileaus poetry
will teach us much about Louis XIVs France at the same time that its form will
please us. Conversely, we should also hope to learn from Boileaus poetic form
and to derive pleasure from its content.
Nicolas Boileau-Despraux (1636 1711) was an almost exact contem-
porary of Frances most famous king, Louis XIV (1638 1715). Born in Paris
into a legal family, Boileau trained as a lawyer, but his inheritance following his
fathers death in 1657 permitted him to abandon a legal career and pursue his true
calling: literature. Boileau has often been portrayed as a frosty figure or as an
angry, embittered man (he was reputedly the model for Molires Alceste in Le
Misanthrope), but this assessment of him is inadequate. During his youth, Boileau
frequented bohemian and even libertine circles, and he included among his last-
ing friends both Molire and Jean La Fontaine. Throughout his life he maintained
friendships with people from a range of backgrounds and of a variety of persua-
sions, a fact that suggests a degree of flexibility and affability on his part. Rather,
Boileaus formidable reputation stems principally from his sharp satirical bent
(which earned him many enemies), compounded by his enthusiastic espousal of
the seemingly rigid doctrines of French Classicism. Boileau began his literary ca-
reer as a satirist, and this aspect of his personal temperament and literary incli-
nation remained with him (if later in a more muted form) throughout his life.
x Introduction
Having established a reputation as a talented and redoubtable satirist in the 1660s,
Boileau turned his attention to literary criticism, adopting a more theoretical ap-
proach in his writing. With the composition and publication of his Art potique in
the early 1670s, he set himself up as the foremost literary critic of his time. The
year 1677 marked a turning point in Boileaus career and that of his lifelong clos-
est friend, Jean Racine. Racines great masterpiece, Phdre (1677), had come
under attack from the playwrights jealous rivals, and both Boileau and Racine
were suspected of having written a scandalous sonnet mocking two important
aristocrats at the French court. Boileau and Racine were eventually absolved
from this controversy. Not only that: that very year they were together appointed
royal historiographers in recognition of their literary and moral merits. No
longer mere writers, Racine and Boileau now formed an integral part of the Sun
Kings court: they accompanied Louis XIV on his military campaigns and were
entrusted with the important task of providing official accounts of his exploits.
In other words, they had become part of the kings famously elaborate propa-
ganda machine. As it turns out, this type of history writing did not sit comfort-
ably with either Racine or Boileau, though the official recognition from the king
(and the generous pension that accompanied it) was certainly pleasing to both of
them. It is no doubt partly because of this royal recognition that Boileau was
elected to the Acadmie Franaise in 1684.
Boileaus late career is bound up with the famous Quarrel of the An-
cients and Moderns, during which many of the leading cultural lights of the day
debated the respective merits of ancient and modern literature and culture. In a
dispute that turned on the possibility of progress, Boileau famously championed
the cause of the ancients after his indignation had been aroused by Charles Per-
raults reading of his overtly modern poem Le Sicle de Louis XIV (The age of
Introduction xi
Louis XIV) at the Acadmie Franaise in 1687. This aspect of Boileaus life and
thought, too, however, has sometimes been misunderstood. As chief representa-
tive of the ancients, Boileau is all too easily perceived as an old-fashioned stick-
in-the-mud, but the truth is far more interesting and complex. First, Boileau was
himself a modern author, and his decision to become a writer demonstrates a sin-
cerely held belief in the merits and possibilities of legitimate modern writing.
Further, he was a staunch defender of several major modern writers when they
came under attack, including Molire and, as we have seen, Racine. It is emphat-
ically not the case, then, that Boileau rejected all modern writing on principle
indeed, his writing career was dedicated to the possibility of the production of
high-quality writing by modern authors. Rather, in addition to his engagement
with modern writers, Boileau also defended the work of their eminent predeces-
sors. And even Boileau was not indiscriminate in his support of ancient literature:
he considered only those ancients whose work had survived to please posterity to
be worthy of our attention. In the same way, he believed in the merit of those
moderns whose work would continue to be appreciated in centuries to come.
Given the importance ascribed by Boileau to the judgment of future generations,
it is all the more remarkable that he was so strikingly perceptive in this regard:
with few exceptions, the authors whose work he praised (notably Molire, Ra-
cine, Pierre Corneille, La Fontaine, and Blaise Pascal) have become canonical,
and those whose work he derided are no longer considered worthy of critical at-
tention. Clearly, Boileau was endowed with a gift for evaluating the canonical
possibilities of contemporary literature, and his assessments continue to speak to
us today.
Whereas audiences of the twenty-first century, as Boileau predicted,
have little difficulty enjoying the works of Racine and Molire, it is perhaps
xii Introduction
harder for us to appreciate the nature and merit of what is now known as French
Classicism. For some critics, Boileau came closer than any other writer both to
exemplifying and to expounding classical doctrine. And certainly our apprecia-
tion of both Boileaus style and his subject is dependent on our appreciation of
French Classicism. Even during its heyday, however, the principles of Classicism
could never be distilled into a coherent doctrine, and the concept remains some-
what slippery. It may be helpful to think of French Classicism as a movement in
the purest sense of the term: like a powerful river, it flowed over many decades,
seemingly consistent to the casual observer but constantly changing in its details.
Before we look at some of the principal tenets of French Classicism we should
note the environment in which it flourished. French Classicism as Boileau em-
braced it has less to do with any rediscovery of ancient texts (a phenomenon
more closely associated with the sixteenth century) than with the rise of an abso-
lutist, centralized regime in seventeenth-century France. Under Louis XIII and
his prime minister, Cardinal Richelieu, the Acadmie Franaise was established
in 1635 as the official arbiter of national linguistic and literary affairs. Under its
influence, French writers and critics were encouraged to be dogmatic, for it was
widely believed that the rules of good writing could and should be defined for
posterity and that this was somehow a matter of state. In our examination of Boi-
leaus Art potique, we would do well to bear this in mind.
In terms of ideas, Boileau contributed little that was new to the classi-
cal movement, and it is to those central ideas adopted by Boileau that we now
turn. As its label suggests, French Classicism inherited a good deal from the writ-
ers of ancient Greece and Rome. Rather than simply copying the work of their
esteemed predecessors, however, French classical writers were expected to ap-
peal to a seventeenth-century audience by similar means and to achieve similar
Introduction xiii
results. If successful, their work would attract readers through the centuries and
become models for future generations of writers. According to classical precepts,
good literature was expected to be pleasing and enjoyable to read but also in-
structive. The didactic function of literature bound it closely with a sense of
morality, and it is in the context of this moral literary perspective that some of
French Classicisms more opaque terms should be understood. Most of us learn
at some point that French writers of the seventeenth century were expected to
follow the precepts of biensance and vraisemblance, but the meaning and appli-
cation of those terms often remain obscure. Vraisemblance and the vraisemblable
designate not simply that which is probable or truthful but, more intriguingly,
that which corresponds to an idealized probability. Similarly, biensance and the
biensant are often explained simply as principles that led to the banishment of sex
and violence from the classical stage. In addition to a desire not to offend the au-
dience with the spectacle of unseemly behavior, biensance has a self-referential
aspect that brings it close to vraisemblance: characters should behave as the audi-
ence would expect them to. The equally problematic principles of nature (nature
or naturalness) and of raison (reason or reasonableness) should also be applied in
this sincere but complex quest for truth and goodness in literature.
In addition to imitation of the ancients, verisimilitude, propriety, and
reason, writers were expected to draw on their good taste and natural instinct for
good writing. Even at a time of dogmatism, however, good taste proved notori-
ously difficult to pin down. Given the subjective bent of so many of these pre-
cepts, then, it is not surprising that even the writers of the time did not always
agree on their precise meaning or application. Part of the richness of seven-
teenth-century debate (and Boileaus contributions to it) is precisely its lively dis-
cussion of these ideas, which turn out to be far more open to interpretation and
xiv Introduction
far less prescriptive than they first appear. Boileau, then, could go only so far in
his recommendations for good writing: ultimately, the quality of a literary work
depended not on any rules or conventions (which anyone could follow) but on in-
spiration, on genius, on the je ne sais quoi (which was available only to the few).
Almost all of Boileaus poetry, including his Art potique, is written in
regular twelve-syllable lines known as alexandrines. The alexandrine was the
preferred meter of French poetry between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries,
though it is most closely associated with classical poetry (and in particular with
the tragedies of Racine). Before we examine Boileaus masterpiece, however, we
should think generally about how best to broach his oeuvre and mention some of
his other poetry. First, we should not (as many have done) adopt an excessively
solemn approach to Boileaus work. Although it is true that he was deeply earnest
in his attitude toward literary composition and that he considered the function of
literature to be very serious indeed, Boileaus first principle was to please his au-
dience. Unless he or she takes pleasure in a poem, the reader or listener will never
take on board any didactic message contained within, and Boileau might as well
write a moral treatise. And even in this moral context, it was widely held that
good poetry had a quasi-moral duty to please. Moreover, Boileau himself clearly
took pleasure in the creative process and enjoyed playing with language. An ex-
pectation of enjoyment will make us more receptive to, among other things, the
humor that is a hallmark of Boileaus writing.
One of Boileaus favorite humoristic strategies is of course satire, and
it is in his bold attacks on social types such as lawyers and moneymen or in his
depiction of courtly and ecclesiastical vice that he is at his most accessible as
well as his most harsh. In his comic and finely observed portraits of contempo-
rary society we see Boileaus dual purpose at work: while we take pleasure in the
Introduction xv
wit and elegance of his writing, we are simultaneously reminded of our own de-
fects as well as those of the people around us. Although Boileau saw himself as
a truth-teller and as a scourge of hypocrisy, mediocrity, and pretentiousness, he
largely avoided being too sermonizing in tone thanks to his fine sense of irony.
As a writer, writing about writing, Boileau was keenly aware of the delicate po-
sition in which he had placed himself. This is apparent not only in the Art po-
tique but also, for instance, in his Satire II, the opening poem of the present
edition. Dedicated to Molire at a time when the playwright was embroiled in
the controversy surrounding his comedy Lcole des femmes, Boileau addresses
in this piece the key question of rhyme. His moral and literary purpose is to pro-
mote the use of good rhyme in poetry. Boileau praises Molire for the ease with
which he composes good rhymes and complains about other poets who are con-
tent with making simple, mediocre rhymes. Most interesting, though, is Boi-
leaus first-person account of his difficulties as a rhymester and his purported
envy of Molire s talent.
Although this is evidence of Boileaus self-deprecating tone, his com-
parison of his own talents with those of Molire may be disingenuous. Molire
was certainly a gifted poet who wrote many of his plays in rhyming alexandrine
verse, but his greatest talent was as a comic actor and playwright. Boileau, by
contrast, was primarily a poet, and one who had both more time than Molire to
polish his work and a greater investment in the nuance of every rhyme. This
example highlights another aspect of Boileaus writing: it is often playful and
sometimes deliberately ambiguous. Rather than attempting any definitive inter-
pretation of his poetry, we may find it more productive simply to delight in Boi-
leaus subtle paradoxes.
It is important, too, to remember that Boileaus poetry was originally
xvi Introduction
intended to be read aloud at small salon-like gatherings. Contemporary accounts
confirm that Boileau was an excellent reader of poetry who displayed a gift for
mimicry. We can be confident, then, that there was nothing dreary about the
early readings of his work. Although we may wish to stop short of re-creating a
seventeenth-century salon, we should pay attention to the sounds of Boileaus
words and the rhythms of his lines, a strong sense of which has been retained in
Burton Raffels translation. The image of Boileau performing his poetry before
an audience is consistent with his lively, quasi-dramatic technique of taking his
listeners to and fro, of guiding them toward one response and then surprising
them with a new twist. With his personal approach (Boileau often appears in the
first person in his poetry), his direct appeal to his audience, and his varied, pol-
ished style, Boileaus other poems delighted many of his contemporaries and
offer much that will delight us.
Boileaus enduring reputation, however, rests chiefly on a single work.
His Art potique is the most complete account of his views on poetry and is widely
regarded as the most important critical work of the time. Written partly in re-
sponse to critics who accused Boileau of being too condemnatory and insuffi-
ciently constructive, the poem is loosely modeled on Horaces Ars poetica and
heavily influenced by Aristotles Poetics (which was first published in French in
1671). Aimed less at scholars than at educated amateurs, the Art potique was in-
tended to define a universal doctrine of poetry. Boileau began work on the poem
in 1669 and gave readings of it in various states of completion from 1672 onward.
In 1674 the work was finished and then published.
Boileaus Art potique is a quest for truth rather than originality, and its
governing principles are those identified above as being central to French Classi-
cism. But Boileau also brings to the subject his unique approach and style, in-
Introduction xvii
cluding his own examples of good and bad poetry. The work is divided into four
cantos, unequal in length and quality. The second and third cantos, dealing with
minor literary genres (including the eclogue, the elegy, the ode, and the sonnet)
and major ones (epic, tragedy, and comedy), respectively, are in many respects
the most accessible. They are largely descriptive and provide a valuable point of
reference for anyone interested in questions of literary genre (though Boileaus
account of French literary history is often inaccurate and should be treated with
caution). For most readers, the third canto (by far the longest of the poem) is the
more interesting of the two, for it deals with the two most important genres of the
period, tragedy and comedy (as well as epic, a genre that is strikingly absent from
the seventeenth-century French canon). In his discussion of tragedy, Boileau re-
minds us of a key paradox of the genre: deeply unpleasant experiences can be con-
veyed in a way that will give the audience pleasure if presented correctly. It is thus
the duty of the tragic poet to ensure that the disagreeable is rendered agreeable
through good writing. In his discussion of comedy, we notice that Boileau praises
Molire for his more elevated comic writing but states that even Molires work
is inferior to that of his great Roman predecessor, Terence. This combination of
references to both the ancients and the moderns is typical of Boileaus keen
awareness of past and present, and emblematic of his preference for the ancients.
The most intriguing portions of the Art potique, however, are its outer
cantos, in which Boileau tackles the potential pitfalls of poetic writing and at-
tempts to define some of the poets more elusive endeavors. It is significant that
the poems opening lines remind the would-be writer of the difficulty inherent in
this ambition. The reader learns from the outset that this is no straightforward
handbook for writing poetry. Indeed, Boileaus poetics are as much a call to bad
xviii Introduction
poets to stop writing as an incitement to talented poets to write well. Moreover,
the nature of Boileaus theories is, as suggested above, such that certain aspects
of them resist definition: How can a poet be certain that he possesses the je ne sais
quoi, the intuitive genius necessary to set him above skillful mediocrity? Simi-
larly, just how morally impeccable must a poet be in his private life to write good
poetry? And to what extent can he conceal any personal moral failing by judi-
cious use of his art? These are some of the questions implicit in Boileaus work,
and the very fact that even Boileau ultimately leaves them unanswered is evi-
dence of their fascinating complexity. The Art potique ends not, as is usually
stated, with praise of Louis XIV but rather with a final reference to the difficul-
ties facing poets and to the corresponding difficulty of Boileaus own task of
writing a good poem about writing good poetry.
Just as there is considerably more to Boileaus Art potique than a
rhymed list of rules, so there is much more to his oeuvre than nicely turned clas-
sical precepts. With his love of the ancients and his fondness for contemporary
references, Boileau can appear remote to the modern reader. And he is certainly,
as I have suggested, a product of his time. But Boileaus humor is timeless, and
many of the questions raised in his work remain central to literary debates today.
He may have arrived at different conclusions from those favored in our post-
modern era, but issues regarding subjectivity and objectivity, the poets relation-
ship to his or her audience, the creation of the literary canon, and the relations
between modern literature and its predecessors, for instance, are not about to be
resolved any time soon. His poetry still has the capacity both to please us and to
make us think again about the nature and purpose of literature, just as Boileau
would have wished.
Introduction xix
Further Reading
Remarkably little has been written in English about either Boileau or French Classicism, but the fol-
lowing books may be of interest.
xx Introduction
Selected Poems
Satire II: To Monsieur de Molire
1. LAbb Michel de Pure (1634 1680). I have taken liberties with his name, as Boileau did
with his character.
2. Philippe Quinault (1635 1688), dramatist, librettist, and son of a Paris baker.
3
My hangdog Muse indifferent, silent, bored.
Then, cursing Fiends who tempt an itching pen, 25
I swear a thousand oaths: oh, never again!
Condemn Apolloall the Musescursing,
When suddenly I see such glorious verses
Spleen be damned, I flame immortal fire,
And once more tilting windmills, pant, aspire. 30
Forgetting useless vows, I stumble, run,
And bouncing line by line, I take what comes.
My tepid Muse enduring tepid music,
I offer well-worn rhyme; she wont refuse it.
I do whats always done, go picking here 35
And there, stitching rags from everywhere.
In praise of Phyllis, call up high-flown miracles;
Marvels found, at once, on matchless pinnacles;
I glorify a face as bright as spheres,
My mistress shines eternal, has no peers, 40
Dealing burning suns and perfect wonders,
Scribbling sky-gold creatures, Joves high thunders.
Throwing splendid phrases, clouds of darts,
I dash off poems: no fuss, no pains, no art.
A hundred times transposing nouns and verbs, 45
My verse resembling chopped-up, stale Malherbe.3
But oh my trembling heart, which dreads the thought
Of words misplaced, and phrases dearly bought,
Panting hard at every rhymeless void
3. Franois de Malherbe (1555 1628), poetic reformer, advocate of clarity, regularity, and
good sense.
4 Satire II
Until my empty verses self-destroy! 50
I start, I stop, begin a dozen times,
And scribbling four, erase the first three lines.
Damn the first wild fool who shaped this path
For turning sense to senseless, gold to brass,
Cramming words in narrow boxesprisons! 55
With rhyme to darken light, befuddle reason.
This deadly craft destroys my days; it smashes
Calm, impales delight, makes leisure ashes:
Id sing, and laugh, and guzzle as I please,
As gay as any priest, as fat, at ease, 60
My days all peaceful, out of thought or care,
Sleeping well, then breathing placid air:
Unworried heart, exempt from burning passion,
Self-limiting, no doorway for ambition,
Fleeing fame and all its pushy friends, 65
Not stunned by royal riches, closed to ends
And means. Id be so happy, envious Fate!
Just free me from this rhymesters crippled gait.
But yet, the moment madcap fancy rings
Its frenzied verses, black clouds fall, and cling, 70
And Demons, loathing gentle peace, fashion
Dreams of polished lines and perfect passion.
Helpless, trapped, I burn in inky rages,
Quarry fragments, rub out ill-starred pages,
And see my life quite ruined by sad-faced art, 75
I even envy Pelletier,4 born to the part.
Satire II 5
Oh happy Scuders,5 blessed with fertile pens,
You spawn a book each month, for years on end,
You write, oh artless, pages drooping, dense,
Plainly shaped as if to spite good sense, 80
But books that sell (and some are even read),
Adored by merchants, praised by empty heads.
The rhymes go clank, in closing scraggly lines,
But no one cares, for see! it clearly rhymes.
You silly fools, enslaving art itself, 85
Try pulling Homer, Virgil off their shelves!
But scribbling idiots love their childish noise,
For what in sottish lines requires a choice?
They gape and labor, stunned, transfixed, amazed:
Did I write that? Oh wondrous, fabled page! 90
While noble spirits struggle, always fail
To capture perfect art (as truth entails),
Depressed to find what poor excuses words
Can be, displeased, yet pleasing all the world.
Their poems stuffed with spirit, still they take 95
No pleasure, wishing they could stop creating.
And you, who see the depths my Muse can sink to,
Grant me grace, teach poems and Muse to think too:
Or else, since even help from you wont work,
Molire! oh teach me how to leave off verse. 100
6 Satire II
To Climne
7
Quatrain on a Portrait of Rocinante, Don Quijotes Horse
8
On My Older Brother, Member of the Acadmie Franaise,
with Whom Id Quarreled
9
Epitaph for the Authors Mother
10
Epigram: The Grateful Debtor
11
A Perpetual Student of Time
12
Satire I
13
Lets hide ourselves from vulgar insults, lies,
Still free, in spite of Fate and savage times,
Unbent by age and callous, casual crimes, 30
Not tottering, old and feeble, blind and gray,
Until at last Death sweeps us all away.
Ive learned, so hear what counsel I can give:
In making France your home, know how to live
In France. So steal your millions, all in cash; 35
Starting nowhere, climb in noble fashion.
Old Jacquin1 knew: his fatal fiscal lore
Destroyed our army swift as plagues, or war,
His profits piled so high that, written down,
Theyd stuff a book all juicy, fat, and round. 40
For money rules this city, sets its rules.
But me, in Paris? Fool amid the fools!
Without a gift for cheating, lies, pretending,
Backbone far too stiff for violent bending.
I cant be cowed enough to let some proud 45
Rich rascal shame me: money talks that loud?
But scribbling flattering sonnets, sure to bore
The world? Selling self and poems to order?
My Muse remains too proud for stooping low.
Im far too rustic, soul too hopeless, gross. 50
Whatever is, I have to call by name:
1. Jacquier, a banker who became high commissioner for military supplies. Arrested for em-
bezzlement in 1662, he spent two years in the Bastille; released for turning informant, he was
later fined 1,800,000 francs.
14 Satire I
A cats a cat, and Charles Rolets2 a shame.
Im not much good at crafting verse seductions:
Adventure leads me off in plain directions.
Paris brings me sadness, left unknown 55
And poor, a body, not a soulalone.
But why, you ask, such wild, such hopeless valor,
Poorhouse-aimed? You really love such squalor?
Wealth allows an honest upright pride,
But poor folk bend their backs, must scrape their hides. 60
And thats how writers, crushed by piled-up debt,
Can change the fate their cursd stars have set,
And pedants, in this iron time, play jokes,
And turn themselves to peers, or royal dukes.
For Fortune plays its games on every virtue: 65
See them triumph, high above their birth-due,
Cruising Paris streets in gaudy coaches,
Decked like clowns, who once were crawling roaches,
Whipping once-proud France with savage laws,
Sucking blood, and flexing fearful claws. 70
Theyre dreadedshould be feared. If you dare dream
Theyve gone (and paid their taxes), watch the scheme:
Theyll reappear before you know it, strutting
City streets, outrageous, powdered, puffing,
Plundering helpless Paris, armed, at war, 75
Offending even Heaven (as oft before).
2. Charles Rolet, parliamentary attorney, exiled and fined in 1681 (though later pardoned).
Satire I 15
And old Colletet,3 muddied to his rear-end,
Begs for bread (though no one wants to hear him),
A practiced bum, like many modish men
Lectured by Montmaur4 againagain. 80
Of course, our king, with hearty royal will,
Drops kindly smiles on poets, tries to fill
Their purses, mending worldly blindness, saving
Phoebus5 from the breadline, poorhouse, grave.
One hopes too much, when kings can practice justice; 85
Maecenas gone, what good is Czar Augustus?
And these days, being just myself, what count
Or prince would bend his knees to drag me out?
Besides, how make my way through all the would-be
Starving poetsmore than really could be 90
Who push and crowd toward any open hand,
And steal the bounty from much better men,
Lazy, sterile hornets, flocks of drones
Robbing honey meant for bees alone.
Why struggle hard for over-touted laurels, 95
When muscles win them, never merit, morals?
Saint-Amants6 humor came from Heaven: France
Gave clothes and shoes, and left the rest to chance.
One bed, two chairs, were all he ever owned;
3. Guillaume Colletet (1598 1659), poet, member of the Academy, and poor.
4. Pierrre de Montmaur (1564 1650), professor of Greek and self-appointed custodian of
morals.
5. That is, Phoebus Apollo.
6. Marc-Antoine de Girard de Saint-Amant (1594 1661), member of the Academy, an often
Rabelaisian poet.
16 Satire I
No gold, no silver, only sticks and stones. 100
And then! So weary, dragging door to door,
He pawned his nothing, went in search of more.
Head heaped with poems, teeming hot his brain,
He came to Court, and hoped for wealth and fame.
What happened, then, to this abused old Muse? 105
He crawled back home in shame, decayed, confused.
Hunger, fever ended courage, fame;
Starvation started, courtiers closed the game.
The Courts own poets were the height of fashion,
Now its clowns and fools who always cash in; 110
No nobler spirit, art of defter pen,
Can rise like butlers, grooms, or scullery men.
Whats needed now? Much different Muse-drawn roles?
Abandon art and ape the lawyers souls?
Then blacks the colorbuckles, wigs, and gowns. 115
Well dance in circles, slow and jurist rounds.
But just the thought bewilders blood and brain:
Im lost, destroyed by violence so insane!
I see the pure go down those greedy maws,
Trapped in mazes, Daedalus wrapped in laws, 120
In whirled confusion, heaped-up legal cheating,
Black now white, both good and bad now fleeting,
And honest Patru7 killed by lawyer sharks
(So fierce that even Cicero fears their bark).
My friends, before I go that route, the Seine 125
7. Olivier Patru (1604 1681), member of the Academy, son of an attorney and himself a
lawyer.
Satire I 17
Will freeze from Paris down to old Saint-Jean,
Jansens8 preachers flog the pope in Rome,
Sorlin9 believe the truth, Pavin10 go wrong.
Lets flee this pushing city, left behind,
Where Honor fights with Fortune, virtues blind, 130
Where strutting Vices walk and talk like kings
(They hold up miters, crosses, wear gold rings),
Where learnings frightened, sad, without support.
Were hunted down like villainsnoble sport!
The only art in fashion, here, is theft. 135
I choke . . . alas, I cannot say the rest.
But what unmoving man would not be moved
By Paris love? Its hate, and hates true love.
Oh how endure it? Once resolved, attack it,
Never mind Apollo! Kill it, smash it! 140
Dont strive for grace, on fatal fields like these!
Dont try for mighty art, when killing fleas.
Why summon beauty, fighting fiends and evil?
Angers good enough to kill the Devil.
Relax, they say. Why get yourself upset? 145
Why fling great words? Talk soft, theres hope still left.
Go climb a chair, preach nice professor talk,
While listeners snore in peace, and let you squawk.
8. A morally austere movement within the Catholic Church, distinctly Calvinist in tone though
not in affiliation; Blaise Pascal (1623 1662) was Jansenisms most celebrated adherent, though
it made many converts among French intellectuals and artists.
9. Jean Desmarets de Saint Sorlin (1595 1676), member of the Academy, ill-disposed both to
Jansenists and to Boileau.
10. Denis Sanguin de Saint-Pavin (1595 1670), a cleric strong neither in conduct nor in faith.
18 Satire I
Now thats the way to deal with wrong, and write.
They talk like that, who never want to fight! 150
They think they need no help, their lives are safe,
They like to sneer a poet in the face.
But weak-kneed men just play at being strong,
Who dont believe in God till things go wrong.
They weep in storms, they pray the angry sky, 155
But tempests done, they laugh at men who cry,
Assured that God will spin the earth around
And keep it balanced, hold it nicely bound.
Their lives ascend, surpassing any sin.
They wont admit the mess our world is in. 160
But even healthy, ah! that other world
Can make me tremble, shake at Gods own word.
But where is God, if I am in this hell?
Im going, gone: Farewell, Paris, farewell.
Satire I 19
The Art of Poetry
Canto One
1. Phoebus Apollo.
2. Franois de Malherbe (1555 1628), poetic reformer, advocate of clarity, regularity, and
good sense.
3. Honorat de Bueil, Lord of Racan (1589 1670), childhood pupil and, in part, disciple of Mal-
herbe.
20
Unwilling cripples still require their crutch. 20
Like Farets4 sometime friend (you know his name),5
Who scribbled poems on tavern windowpanes
(Which wasnt nice) and raised his haughty voice
To sing the ancient triumphs of the Jews.
He followed Moses over desert sands 25
And drowned, both he and Pharaoh, in those lands.
Whatever themeif pleasant or sublime
Make sure that sense will always match the rhyme:
How often concord falters, jangles, fades,
Though meaning should be master, rhyme a slave. 30
So rack your brain, arrange the proper weight,
And sooner, later, rhyme accepts its fate,
Yoked by Reason, shooting at the mark,
And bringing Light, instead of dreary Dark.
Rhyme can blind a poet, boasting in secret, 35
Then pride goes toppling: see? he has no readers!
So cherish Reason: all your work should show
That glory, shine that light; the world will know.
Yet poets, wildly pushed by far-fetched yearning,
Hunt for flaming sense, and words all burning, 40
Convinced theyre shamed, their monstrous work condemned,
If other poets ever write like them.
But shun excess: let gay Italians prance
4. Nicolas Faret (1596 1646), member of the Academy, poet, and friend of fellow poet and
Academy member Guillaume Colletet (1598 1659).
5. Marc-Antoine de Girard de Saint-Amant (1594 1661), member of the Academy, an often
Rabelaisian poet.
7. Charles Coypeau, Lord DAssoucy (1604 1675), author of burlesques and a bad translation
of Ovid.
8. Clment Marot (1496 1544), Protestant poet, known equally for his light, witty verses and
for his translations of the Psalms.
9. Georges de Brbeuf (1618 1661), translator-adaptor of Lucans Pharsalia (an epic on the
Caesar-Pompey civil war in Rome) and author of a burlesque of Virgils Aeneid.
10. Franoise Escal, one of Boileaus Pliade editors, remarks, at this point, It is clear that
Boileau, like others of his time, is quite mistaken: medieval poetry was governed by very strict
rules (Boileau, Oeuvres compltes [Paris: Gallimard, 1966], 991n20).
11. Pierre de Ronsard (1524 1585), poet and humanist, leader of the French Pliade school,
which included Joachim du Bellay (1522 1560) and drew on Jean Dorat (15081588), profes-
sor at the Collge de France.
12. Philippe Desportes (1546 1606) and Jean Bertaut (1552 1611), Pliade disciples, prima-
rily poets of love and religious faith.
13. Franois de Malherbe (1555 1628), poetic reformer, advocate of clarity, regularity, and
good sense.
Canto Two
15. Jean Ogier de Gombaut (15701666), Franois Maynard (15821646), and Claude de Malle-
ville (15971647), all poets and original members of the Academy.
16. That is, Sejanus: Boileau too docked the tails on names, when he had to.
17. Mathurin Rgnier (1573 1613), easygoing man, rigorous moral satirist. A hereditary
churchman, he had a reputation, probably undeserved, for dissolute behavior.
18. Franoise Escal quotes Claude Brossettes Remarks (1716): Some years before the publica-
tion of this poem, a remarkably handsome young man, named Petit, was caught printing such
godless, free-thinking poems. He was arrested, tried, and sentenced to be hanged and then
burned, in spite of all the urgent appeals made in his favor (Boileau, Oeuvres compltes, 996n1).
19. Franois Payot de Linire (1628 1704), poet, satirist, initially Boileaus friend and later his
enemy.
20. Robert Nanteuil (1630 1678), famous pastel portraitist and (especially) engraver.
22. As in Saint-Amants Mose sauv (Moses saved, 1653). The next reference is also to Saint-
Amants work.
23. In Scudrys Alaric (1654).
Canto Four
26. LAbb Claude Boyer (16181698), authorfrom 1646 to 1695of innumerable mediocre
tragedies and tragi-comedies; tienne Martin de Pinchesne (16161701), poet, pedant, editor.
27. Jules Pilet de la Mesnardire (?1663), a painter of richly artificial landscapes, published
Posies in 1656; his writing has only recently been rediscovered. Although Sylvain Monant
identifies Rampale as an auteur mdiocre (mediocre writer; Boileau: Oeuvres, ed. Sylvain
Monant, vol. 2 [Paris: Garnier-Flammarion, 1969], 110), he seems to have been well regarded
by his contemporaries; see Boileau, Oeuvres compltes, 1002n4.
28. Savinien de Cyrano de Bergerac (1619 1655), soldier, writer, mythologized by himself
and, subsequently, by Rostand and others.
29. Pierre Motin (1566 1610), cabaret poet, known in his day for bawdy verse.
30. Guillaume Colletet (1598 1659), poet, member of the Academy, and poor.
31. Pierre Corneille (1606 1684), dramatist; predecessor and rival of Racine.
32. Jean Racine (1639 1699), tragic playwright; the Shakespeare of the French stage.
33. Isaac de Benserade (1613 1691), poet, dramatist, and wit, who worked with the court com-
poser Jean-Baptiste Lully (1632 1687).
34. Jean Regnauld de Segrais (1624 1701), poet, dramatist, and critic, who left the Church for
literature.
35. Famous battle of the war in the Low Countries; France, defeated, was forced to recognize
Dutch independence.